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WOMEN AND SPANISH FASCISM -- THE WOMEN'S SECTION OF THE FALANGE 1934-1959 |
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3. Modernity and reaction: SF and religion As part of the rallying forces against the ‘godless’ Second Republic, the Falange explicitly acknowledged and supported the Catholic Church as a fundamental pillar of Spanish society. The prime minister, Manuel Azaña, had told Parliament in 1931 that Spain was no longer Catholic, referring to the fact that the real importance of religion in daily life had diminished. [1] However, whilst religious observance had lessened, the Church’s influence in State affairs, particularly its control of education, was still widespread. This was recognized by the new Republican government as a reinforcement of social division which effectively blocked the betterment of the working-class poor. [2] Azaña’s political opponents, however, presented the Republican religious legislation as an attack not just on the Church but on the family and property as well. [3] Republican laws that separated Church and State, ended State funding to the Church and religious orders, expelled the Jesuits and secularized primary and secondary education offended many on the Right. To practising Catholics, these laws (together with the introduction of civil marriages and a divorce law) were a direct attack on their religious beliefs. Others, such as landowners, were already deeply critical of proposed agrarian reform that would appropriate areas of privately owned estates to give to the landless poor. The government’s anticlericalism in their eyes was further proof of its intention to destroy the established social order. This belief was shared by the Falange. Its support for Catholicism was both an indictment of Republican legislation and the conviction that religion was an essential part of Spanish national identity. [4] As José Antonio had said: ‘The new State will be founded on Spain’s traditional Catholic religious spirit and the Church will be given the consideration and support which is its due.’ [5] This defence of Catholicism became an important part of the Falange’s identification with the Nationalist cause, although in fact, José Antonio’s support of religion was qualified by a recognition that there was a potential conflict of interests between Church and State. He saw that the power of the established Church could frustrate the Falangist agenda of social reform and favoured its separation from the State. The ‘Initial Points’ of the Falange had balanced the two views, endorsing the Church while pointing to the need to clarify its functions: The whole reconstruction of Spain must be Catholic in outlook. That is not to say that non-Catholics will be persecuted. The times of religious persecution have long passed. Nor does this mean that the State will take direct control of those religious matters which are the Church’s responsibility. Even less will it tolerate any interference or machinations of the Church which could possibly harm the dignity of the State or national integrity. [6] But this essential difference between the Falange and other right-wing groups was less important than the conservative agenda which united them in their ‘Crusade’ against the Second Republic. In this sense, as Frances Lannon has said, Catholicism was a ‘convenient shorthand for a whole series of conservative aims and pursued with varying emphases and priorities by constitutional monarchists, Carlists and law and order republicans’. [7] The Falange’s stance on religion was shared by Sección Femenina (SF) at the beginning of the Civil War. It had supported opponents of the Second Republic who had condemned efforts of its first government to curb its power. Religion did not figure separately in its statutes nor in the SF oath but traditional Catholic values were implicit in the vision of woman it projected. She was man’s helper and subordinate, whose main role in life was as wife and mother. But from 1938, at the point where SF began to organize formal training for its elites, its engagement with Catholicism went beyond support for the Nationalist cause. This chapter is concerned with Pilar Primo de Rivera’s development of a religious identity within SF and the bearing that this had on the wider self-image of the organization. It examines how the inclusion of religion within SF’s training programmes was instrumental in determining a gender model for the elite members, thereby distancing SF from traditional Catholic aid agencies and confessional groups. Relatedly, the chapter considers the extent to which its particular gender model contributed to a perception of SF as being both ‘different’ and ‘more modern’ than other women’s groups. Up to 1938, however, SF’s stance on the role of women in the war was indistinguishable from that of mainstream Catholic groups. Members’ contribution was self-sacrifice and fortitude and their ‘natural’ sensitivity and spirituality found best expression in domesticity, nursing and caring for children. Early SF propaganda leant on Biblical references to make the point. A domestic science manual praised the industrious housewife in the Gospel 8 and, as delegates were told at the 1939 national conference, the successful outcome of the SF programme would be the Old Testament vision of the perfect home: The words of the Scriptures will be true of you: ‘Your wife will be like a fertile vine in the area of your home. Around your table your children will be like olive shoots … and you will see your children’s children and the peace of Israel.’ [9] New Testament role models were combined by the SF press to create an idealized vision of an SF member. Like Mary Magdalene who washed Christ’s feet, Martha who received Him in her house and Veronica who wiped His face, members would have an important role in the New Spain and would bring ‘the tenderness of Mary and the hardworking knowledge of Martha’ to their task. [10] For early members, who were predominantly from the upper classes, the Martha and Mary principle built on a tradition of women’s involvement with which they were familiar. Nursing, in particular, was an accepted channel for women’s energies. In the war years, SF trained many nurses, and the fact that they frequently worked alongside nuns reinforced the saintly connotations of their work. There was shared ground, too, in the practice of religion and the acceptance of its centrality to the Nationalist cause. In common with other women’s organizations such as Catholic Action, SF’s early religiosity was inseparable from the political circumstances of the Civil War. Devout Catholics in newly liberated provinces were no doubt keen to reaffirm their faith but it was also the case that public expression of religion was a token of loyalty to the regime. Open-air Masses where huge numbers gathered to give thanks for the conquest of a new province were not necessarily spiritual occasions. Although adhesion to the Nationalist cause did not change, the first of the elite members began to undertake training for leadership, and it was at this point that the religious identity and profile of SF changed, as the early sentimentality of its propaganda message developed into something more weighty than a statement of political support. In the political training for elites, religion was brought to the forefront as part of the core beliefs of Falangism. José Antonio had posited the existence of a Spanish national soul which was inescapably Catholic. The individual was ‘the bearer of eternal values’, made in God’s image and was part of a collective national enterprise termed the ‘unit of destiny’. [11] In this understanding, Spain could retrieve its former position of importance in the world through the collective efforts of its citizens. Service to the Falange was the channel for this national enterprise because, uniquely, it harnessed both the material and spiritual energies of its members. Membership of Falange was not just a commitment to work for the good of the nation: it was a statement of faith in the spiritual potential of each Spaniard. If within Falangism it was hard to separate the political from the religious, the death of José Antonio made the distinction even less clear. The more fanatical members of the male Falange cast him as a Christ figure and the political circumstances of his life were reinvented as the Crucifixion story. In Falangist propaganda, he became a martyr in the cause of the nation:
They killed him, as they did
Christ, Most lurid of all was the ‘Vía-Crucis’, published in 1938 by the Falangist, José María Amado. This represented José Antonio’s suffering as both the historical situation of Spain and the Passion of Christ. Jesus’s death sentence was paralleled with the proclamation of the Second Republic, the stripping of His clothes was the imprisonment of José Antonio and His crucifixion the rebirth of Spain in the Civil War. The death on the Cross marked the ‘blue martyrdom’ and His burial the promise of renewed national glory. [13] It was not just fanatical Falangists who encouraged this line of thinking. In the same year as the publication of ‘Vía-Crucis’, the wartime government in Burgos ordered a list of the Nationalist war dead to be engraved on the outside of every parish church, with José Antonio’s as the first name. [14] Memorial crosses erected after the war were similarly inscribed and their symbolic meaning exploited by the Falange press: ‘The crosses of our Fallen are made of the same wood as the true Cross.... Things perish with time, but he remains as he was and his image is there for all those who ask for it.’ [15] The cult surrounding José Antonio had consequences for SF. It was on the fringes of the male Falange’s extreme views, with one propaganda message going so far as to liken the National-syndicalist Revolution to the Holy Trinity -- ‘José Antonio who teaches you, Franco who loves you and Christ on the Cross presiding over you’. [16] And if members of SF found it difficult to disentangle love of José Antonio from love of God, it was hardly surprising, since SF edited his works and made them required reading on all its courses. The format of the book, with its index and concordance, resembled an edition of the Bible and members were urged to get into the habit of reading him directly, in order that they might ‘use the same words as him, react in the way he used to react, get upset and be pleased by the same things that upset and pleased him’. [17] But Pilar recognized danger signs. Amado’s ‘Vía-Crucis’ was a clear indication that homage to the dead leader had become unhealthy and she ordered the book to be burned, seeing it as a violation of her own strong Catholic beliefs. [18] A former mando recalls being told in La Mota that SF members were to pray for José Antonio, not to him. [19] Similarly, Pilar never allowed SF a formal act of commemoration on 20 November, the day of José Antonio’s death. This was not an official Francoist holiday but the National Movement marked it annually by events of mourning, processions and masses. SF limited itself to holding a service, recognizing that the significance of the day lay in remembering the death of José Antonio, not expressing personal grief. Common sense appears to have prevailed and the exaggerations of some male Falangists were rejected as ‘not authentic’. Contradictions abounded, however. Amado was outlawed, but the spirit of adulation marking the funeral procession was dubbed ‘poetic’ and was therefore acceptable to SF, as was the collection of sonnets written in praise of José Antonio by Falangist poets. [20] The reality was that the teachings of José Antonio were only very slightly concerned with religion. The specifically religious component of SF programmes was not inspired by his sayings nor introduced as an antidote to hero worship, but was an end in itself, the preferred way of encouraging faith. In her memoirs, Pilar claims that she felt a need during the Civil War to formalize religious training in view of the rapidly expanding membership base. [21] This was probably politically expedient. Since the Decree of Unification in April 1937, the Falange was struggling to find common ground with the Traditionalists, with whom it was now joined. The difficulties were compounded in SF, where there were not only ideological differences but a real conflict of interest with the Traditionalists’ women’s section. Another factor may have been SF’s early difficulty in gaining credibility with the Catholic Church. The sight of women aid workers rushing to help in the liberated zones apparently ruffled the feathers of some priests, who would have preferred to rely on the traditional welfare programmes of the religious orders. There were probably other concerns on the horizon. Pilar doubtless wished to ensure that SF would have a say in deciding how religion was to be taught in schools. [22] More controversially, by 1938, plans were well under way for training the first SF physical education instructors. These women would shortly be working in schools, many of which were convents. Pilar may have had a thought for the inevitable battles ahead when she judged it advisable to find an intermediary between her and the Church. Her choice was Fray Justo Pérez de Urbel, a Benedictine from the abbey of Silos. He accepted Pilar’s invitation to head the programme and from that moment SF ‘entered a whole new world which took us towards God’. [23] Fray Justo’s associations with both the military and the Church hierarchies made him a valuable ally for SF, which in 1938 was still fighting for its ground with other factions after the Unification. He had worked with Catholic organizations including the female youth movement of Catholic Action and had strong links with the intellectual and artistic wing of the Falange. His fascination with the history of Spain together with his religious pedigree made him the embodiment of Falangist values -- someone who could draw readily on the past to provide parallels and answers for current problems. [24] In his views on the role of women in society, however, Fray Justo added nothing to José Antonio’s few words on the subject and mainstream Catholic opinion. When he spoke at SF national and provincial conferences, he declared her place to be in the home: ‘her poem, her discovery, her masterpiece’, and demonized women with intellectual aspirations: ‘You will see her immobile, devouring book after book…. Instead of the Gospel or the “Confessions of St. Augustine” or “The Perfect Wife” of Fray Luis de León or “The History of Art”, you will find all manner of insubstantial or dangerous books.’ [25] With such strong views expressed, Fray Justo as national adviser was able to give the full weight of ecclesiastical authority to SF’s religious training programmes and its code of conduct. His remit was to write the courses for members and unaffiliated women and to coordinate the team of clergy engaged by SF to teach religion to the above groups. He contributed to many of the organization’s religious publications and advised Pilar on how to proceed with difficult areas, such as regulations on bathing costumes and sports outfits for the girls. [26] But apart from adding to SF’s operational efficiency and legitimating its programmes, Fray Justo made a lasting impact on the core of the organization, the elite members. In broad terms, his religious and political views coincided with the Establishment, but he was a Benedictine monk as well as a priest. The Benedictine tradition was liturgical, and the Order saw communion with God as being achieved through direct, disciplined participation in acts of worship. [27] Fundamental to this was choral singing, the use of the prayer book and acts of meditation, none of which were in common use outside religious communities. Ironically, in appointing Fray Justo, Pilar was proving SF’s credentials as loyal to the Church while committing SF to a programme of radical change. In less than a year after his appointment, she told national conference members that the organization wanted all women to ‘have thorough religious training, removing certain things which are not necessary and which actually prevent them from understanding the full grandeur of the liturgy ordained by the Church’. [28] Her own religious background had none of the innovations which she admired in the Benedictines. She had been educated at convent schools and was brought up in a religious tradition which included praying to the Virgin Mary, reciting the rosary and regular church attendance. [29] But as a Falangist, Pilar’s views on religion coincided with those of José Antonio. As she told her members in 1942: We cannot think of our comrades as having two separate identities: part Falangist and part Catholic. Rather, we understand these two elements making up the whole, in the same way as body and soul together are part of every human being and as a person one is both Catholic and Spanish. [30] There was a sense in which Fray Justo’s new style of religious observance was a two-edged sword. Not only was it a vehicle for SF members to express their faith (and their politics) positively; it also pointed the contrast with the past. Pilar’s interpretation of José Antonio’s ‘Revolution’ with its society ‘set on its feet’ was that women should be restored to the family. [31] On the premise that the main barrier to this was the fundamental ignorance of the female population, Pilar saw education in religious matters as central to the Falangist Revolution. Pilar made a direct connection between religious observance and the nation’s moral and spiritual health. But although SF was always fully supportive of the regime’s Catholic orientation, Pilar developed a critical view of existing observances. The status quo of religious practices was presented to members as the consequence of political ‘misunderstandings’ of previous eras and the effects of Republican legislation. In this sense, education in religious matters could be represented as a break with the past, indicative of a determination to present modern ideas, or, at least to re-present essential values in ways which would engage hearts and minds. The participative, disciplined nature of Benedictine worship would ensure that everyone, particularly in the villages ‘alone, lost in their ignorance’, would be educated in the true faith. [32] It was certainly true that religious observance did not necessarily denote sincerity of belief. As Frances Lannon has described, the ceremony of the Mass before the reforms of the Second Vatican Council was less a service of public participation than a remote spectacle which provided a backcloth for the congregation’s private devotions. [33] In this context, saying the rosary or venerating statues in the church while the service was going on was entirely acceptable. Another concern was the relationship between popular religiosity (the veneration of local saints and Virgins, holy processions organized by communities, for example) and true Catholic faith, particularly in rural areas. Popular rites and devotions in Spain were not necessarily accompanied by regular church attendance. [34] Added to this was the fine line between religiosity and superstition. A former member recalls that in very poor Castilian villages in the 1940s and early 1950s there was belief in amulets and miraculous cures effected by the local saint or Virgin and in people’s own prayers as a substitute for going to Mass: ‘Bells ring for Mass, we cannot be there, let angels go instead of me and offer up a prayer.’ [35] Religious ignorance was also seen by Pilar in terms of social class. As she told her members in 1940, the poorest women were in simple ignorance of their duties ‘to their menfolk, to the Nation and to God’ whereas the better-off had interpreted religion to their convenience and with insufficient rigour: Even women with the best education, including in religion, see things wrongly. They would never commit a sin against the fifth, sixth or seventh Commandment, but think nothing of criticizing someone or, for the slightest of reasons, of disobeying the Commandment to fast. They fail to remember that there are not just three or four Commandments, made to suit them. There are ten which are the Law of God, a further five belonging to the Church and seven deadly sins. [36] SF’s new religious programmes satisfied Pilar’s desire for more spirituality and the need to transmit religion in the context of José Antonio’s teachings. SF had nothing to do with the teaching of religion in schools, which remained the preserve of the Church, but all its training courses for adult members, youth members and social service students included a religious component, taught mainly by Fray Justo’s team of monks and priests. [37] And before long, SF staff were being trained as auxiliaries for Fray Justo’s team as programmes expanded. The introduction of a standard SF guide to the liturgy ensured a common approach throughout its centres and at every level of the organization. It was in the national schools that Fray Justo’s innovations were the most striking, since the chapel in each was the establishment’s doctrinal and spiritual core, and religious life a fully integrated part of every course. Weekday Mass was said as a dialogue between the priest and the congregation, unlike the usual pre-Vatican Council services where little participation was required. There were psalms and Gregorian chant, and certain parts of the Mass were in Castilian. [38] Most radically of all, many chapels had a central altar, and in all of them the priest faced the congregation. After the Second Vatican Council this became a requirement but in post-war Spain it was unheard of outside certain religious communities. Training literature for teachers in the SF travelling schools emphasized the potential of mandos to influence religious observance and all matters of public morality but the reality was probably less spectacular. When women were engaged in welfare or educational programmes, the important issues were health and literacy. The relevance of religion was what it taught about social justice, the belief that human beings should be helped to help themselves. In this sense, the politics of José Antonio and Christian ethics were fully compatible. This idea was encouraged, no doubt intentionally, by the format of political education school textbooks, which until the 1960s were written in a question and answer format, resembling the catechism: Why do we say that humankind is the bearer of eternal values? Because having defined the nation as a unit of destiny in the universal order, we must value the human beings who are to fulfill that destiny. And who will carry out the destiny that the Spanish nation must fulfill in the world? The Spanish people. Who are the Spanish people? People like all peoples made by God in His image and likeness. [39] Arguably more significant than the content of the religious education was the manner and context of its delivery to trainee mandos. Expectations were high and classes were intensive. Teaching at the national schools was not just the exposition of Catholic dogma: it included discussion and participation was expected. One past member recalls that a lesson on the Sixth Commandment by the priest at La Mota led to a discussion of human sexual behaviour -- a contrast from her convent upbringing where the subject had been taboo. [40] The openness and participation extended to members’ personal devotions, where the austerity of SF chapels and the simplicity of services encouraged serious reflection. It was a far cry from the trappings associated with middle-class religious practices. With the adoption in 1939 of St. Teresa of Avila as the organization’s patron, the message was reinforced that SF women’s identity was inextricable from religion. But the choice also established the particular reading of SF identity as different from the more usual model, the Virgin Mary. It was Teresa’s combination of faith (‘a pure knowledge of God’) with practical action (‘having her feet on the ground’) which fitted so well with Pilar’s vision of religion. [41] And Teresa’s role as foundress of convents made the connection between SF service and the religious life. In the memory of a contemporary, Pilar liked to compare SF members with teresianas, groups of lay women who had taken a religious promise to dedicate themselves to work in education. [42] The model of Teresa, the style of worship established by Fray Justo and the fact that many SF members had exceeded their original Martha and Mary role all contributed to a new understanding of religion within SF after the Civil War. It distanced SF conclusively from confessional aid groups, which set their good deeds in a traditional religious framework. [43] The journals of Catholic Action, for example, stressed that women’s main contribution to the needs of the nation was an acceptance of original sin: ‘Everywhere there is unremitting suffering and never-ending lamentation…. Suffering is necessary because it is the antidote to sin.’ [44] In contrast to the energy of St. Teresa, it was the Virgin Mary’s passivity and self-effacing purity which provided the model for Catholic Action women in their proselytizing campaigns directed at the needy and morally deficient. The ‘funny and adorable Cinderellas of charity’, [45] as the Falangist press described Catholic Action’s women members, were certainly very different from SF’s own members. Stereotypical female behaviour in general was despised and categorized in the organization as ‘soppiness’ (ñoñería). The word was used frequently in training literature to describe the antithesis of SF style and ‘way of being’. It encompassed a range of perceived negative qualities, such as superficiality and lack of moral robustness. In the religious sense (and it was here that the term was most frequently applied), women considered ñoñas were ostentatiously pious, observing the traditions and practices of the Church without necessarily having the faith to put them into any real context. The hallmarks of religious ñoñería were the saying of novenas, excessive devotions and private prayers to saints and an exaggerated humility towards the clergy. So clear was the common understanding of the word that it was part of SF selection criteria for its courses, grants and awards. Mandos supplying references were obliged to comment on the applicant: ‘Specify whether she is ñoña or whether she possesses a profound religious education.’ [46] The core purpose of SF’s religious education was the philosophical perspective on life which it gave each mando. Catholic Action’s programmes were perceived as narrow, focusing on charity handouts and rarely going outside the parish. SF work, on the other hand, was based on the principles of self-help and education. The seriousness of discussions in the religion classes helped mandos deal with difficult social and moral problems and above all, change the mentality of people. Work in the villages, particularly, was concerned with penetrating the perceived apathy and acceptance of poor living conditions. To do so, staff members needed tolerance and acceptance of human frailties. Once a mobile class team came into a village, for example, the staff member in charge tried to develop close relationships with women in the village. Her office became the consulting room to which many came for advice on problems, including personal and marital. [47] The foundation of the help given was the specialist courses but also the religious base that had been established at La Mota and other training schools. The readiness of staff members to tackle moral issues was coupled with their own forceful image as missionaries of Falangism. ‘We are a religious militia’, teacher trainers were told, ‘and when we feel as much spiritually for the Fatherland as the Falange does, then by serving the country we shall be serving God.’ [48] However, these religious and social energies coupled with the innovations of Fray Justo did not escape the censure of local church hierarchies. SF was in the unfortunate position of being criticized by the very institution it worked so hard to support. In the case of the changed style of worship, it was not a question of having to seek formal permission, since Fray Justo carried national authority. The changes were within the parameters of the liturgical movement and did not contravene ecclesiastical law, but were sufficiently controversial as to arouse suspicion and mistrust in certain bishops. Pilar was always anxious to maintain good relationships at both parish and diocese level and in many cases this worked, as for example at the opening of the chapel at La Mota. Pilar had already been in contact with the Bishop of Valladolid to seek his approval for the dialogued Mass and he presided at the opening ceremony, giving the chapel his official blessing. [49] The Bishop of Avila, however, was less accommodating in his attitude to the building of the chapel at Las Navas. Fray Justo had designed a centrally placed altar, but the bishop of Avila refused to consecrate the chapel, despite the mando’s efforts to persuade him. [50] The opposition of the bishops may have been less for ecclesiastical reasons than from a broader distrust of SF women based on their social behaviour and belief in educational programmes. Certainly it was the bishops to whom mother superiors in convent schools appealed whenever they had problems with the SF teachers drafted in to teach domestic science, sport, music and political education. The problems were legion. Apart from resentment that secular staff should be allowed to teach alongside nuns, there was strong feeling that the areas of study themselves were unsuitable. After the subjects became compulsory, nuns had to face the necessity of retraining or, even less palatable to many, of paying SF to come in and teach the classes. Although the SF press carried a story of one mother superior enthusiastically teaching national-syndicalism after doing her instructor’s course, the reality was that bad feeling was widespread. [51] As discussed in Chapter 1, particular exception was taken to the teaching of physical education, despite the fact that the stipulated sports garment had Fray Justo’s approval. Opposition from the Church was also directed specifically at the teaching of domestic science. Although seemingly uncontroversial, it did include first aid and childcare. Protests came both nationally from the teaching orders’ professional body and locally, where it was directed at the local SF staff trying to implement the programme. [52] In one instance, a bishop told SF to suspend all domestic science teaching. When challenged by the mando, he explained that nuns had complained to him that in childcare classes, pupils were given information that was too frank. [53] Because of earlier protests from the Church, the childcare programme had already dropped all mention of antenatal matters and taught postnatal care only, so this was a further blow. The response from SF was robust: Pilar defended her stance to the nuns’ professional association by reminding them that they owed their existence and that of their schools to the sacrifices of the Falange in the Civil War and that many religious communities and convents outside the association were actively seeking their help in establishing such courses. [54] At a local level, SF reacted pragmatically. Where there was support or at least no open opposition, the entire programme was taught. If there were difficulties, staff would try to convince the bishop or mother superior. But in the final instance, the need for good relations was paramount and they would cede the point. [55] Despite the impeccable social aims of the organization, [?] the public face of SF continued to challenge and upset ecclesiastical hierarchies. The first staff members of La Mota, for example, were banned by the bishop from riding their bicycles up and down to the castle. [56] The leader of the first mixed student camp organized by the Falange students’ syndicate in 1957 remembers being told that the bishops were going to keep a very strict eye on the proceedings. [57] The clashes appear to have ended in the 1960s after the Second Vatican Council when, apart from the liturgical changes (which hardly impacted on the SF), the new emphasis on social justice did much to align SF’s joseantoniano populism with mainstream Church practice. The reforms removed many of the injustices seen by members in convent schools, where poorer, non-fee-paying pupils frequently received an inferior education within the same establishment and from the same teachers. There was, however, a profound difference between the perception of religion by the elites and those on the edges of the organization. Most visible on the periphery was SF’s support for the Church as a pillar of the regime. Here, it shared ground with Catholic Action in its rejection of Republican ideas of morality and women’s rights. Both accepted the authority and hierarchy of the Catholic Church and its role in Franco’s Spain. Woman’s role within this was as upholder of religion. As a Catholic wife and mother she would be an educator of her children and encourage those around her (including her husband) in the faith. For both Catholic Action and SF, Catholicism was part of Spanish heritage. Reaffirming religious traditions such as family prayers or the building of a Christmas crib was a statement of cultural as well as spiritual identity: The foreign Christmas tree does not fit into the austere, idealistic homes of Spain…. The imagination of the Spanish child is not content with the paltry vision of a Father Christmas. He needs great processions of fine slaves from the East leading long caravans of precious cargoes. [58] Similarly, lesser-ranking members of SF who worked with aid agencies appeared to share traditional views of religion. Volunteers in the welfare body of the Falange, Social Aid (Auxilio Social), came closer to the Catholic model of charity than did SF mandos. Social Aid’s orphanages and nurseries were staffed largely with social service students. [59] Its descriptive literature was moralistic and sentimental, emphasizing the responsibility of staff to be a link with the parish and those in their care. [60] It was here, one step removed from the distinct religious identity of the SF programme but nevertheless involved in spiritual matters, that girls and women helped to re-Christianize sectors of the population. In orphanages, maternity homes and welfare centres, volunteers from Catholic Action worked alongside SF-trained girls and women to ensure that with ‘no liberalesque respect for the freedom of the child’s conscience’ all in care attended communion classes and weekly Mass. [61] It was important for Pilar to maintain SF’s credibility with the Church. The price of successful programmes in the community was compliance with Church authorities and here, Pilar acted decisively. In matters concerning religious etiquette, she required correctness from all in any way connected with SF. No sporting events scheduled for Sunday could begin before eleven o’clock, so that members would not be diverted from attending Mass. In the case of an away fixture, the local mando carried the responsibility of informing the visitors of times of services and directions on how to get there. Transport arrangements had to take into account likely delays that might entail members missing church. [62] Public behaviour, particularly where members were in the company of religious or priests, had to be above reproach, as for example at the 1944 rally at El Escorial, where most were lodged in convents or in the monastery itself: ‘They will behave with the sobriety that exists in the Falange and the respect which is owed to religious houses, so that never through the frivolousness of a comrade will anyone think badly of the Falange.’ [63] SF staff setting up their programmes in the mobile classes were required to offer assistance to the local priest without usurping his authority. Guidelines told them to involve him fully in planning the village’s programme, to refer ‘doubtful’ moral or religious problems to him and to maintain the correct distance at all times. [64] To those on the edges of the organization SF was not afraid to proselytize, although it was done sensitively, as for example at Christmas 1946 when all married members were contacted and sent leaflets of prayers. Together with a letter from Pilar explaining why SF considered religion so essential to them was the apology: ‘Forgive this if it seems a little like interference in your family life, but it is merely the desire that you too should participate in what we consider the best things.’ [65] There are many instances of Pilar campaigning to keep religion a live issue, such as pilgrimages to Rome and Santiago, and when in 1950 she received Papal blessing for the work of SF, ‘it was like a consecration of its name and activities’. [66] But despite SF’s enthusiasm for its religious activities and commitment to the Benedictine style of worship, non-believers were accepted among staff members. The religious education classes provided a rationale and a moral base to SF’s programmes but stopped short of requiring personal faith. Trainee mandos were assessed on their religious knowledge, not the strength of their beliefs. [67] Religious faith was not a requirement of membership of SF nor of promotion. It was acceptable to be non-practising and to admit it. At national schools, attendance in chapel was only compulsory at morning and evening prayers and Sunday Mass, and Pilar was insistent that religious observance should not be forced upon the youth members: ‘They should not take the sacraments with a bad grace, just to stay in with the mandos.’ [68] As long as members believed in Falangism and were not actively against the Church, strength of faith counted less than teaching ability and leadership qualities. This was no doubt visible to few outside the core of SF. To Church hierarchies, it was frequently SF’s interventions into education which appeared its more obvious identity tag. And ultimately, the distrust of the Bishop of Avila was perhaps more significant than the carpings of mother superiors. The innovations of Fray Justo were unwelcome because they heralded a more active and empowered female membership, which would inevitably challenge the status quo. The fact that SF staff members had been given the opportunity to question their values and test their beliefs affected their ways of working and their own behaviour. Particularly in the early post-war years, the memory of José Antonio was undoubtedly strong, and even without overt hero worship of the dead leader, there was always to be an overlap between the teachings of Falangism and those of the Catholic Church. But the strength of joseantoniano doctrine in conjunction with SF’s religious practice and training altered its members’ perceptions. It harnessed energies and convictions that led some to dub SF women the nuns of the Movement and the Archbishop of Valladolid to assert that there was no finer convent in Spain than La Mota. [69] These missionaries of Falangism, however, were worldly-wise. Unlike many of their contemporaries in Catholic Action, they often travelled alone and lived away from their families. They were likely to be on working terms with the parish priest, not passive members of his congregation. They were smartly dressed, physically fit working women who, in José Antonio’s words, were both ‘religious and social’. [70] The modernity of the self-image of the SF mando was illustrative of the shifting meaning and context of religion within the organization. Religion was recognized as an essential component of Spanish nationhood and the vehicle through which wives and mothers would express and propagate moral values to their families. It was therefore at the heart of SF’s full identification with the regime’s moral agenda, indicated by its work in Christianizing the population, its deference to ecclesiastical authorities and the scale of its own religious programmes. These efforts also pointed to SF’s willingness to integrate with all sectors of the regime, recognizing the sensibilities of the Church and non-Falangist aid organizations. But alongside this, scrutiny of SF’s religious identity gave Pilar the chance to mark out new ground for her organization. Although her original motives for doing so were probably only to protect SF from criticism, it is the case that in this area, she moved the organization away from traditional thinking. Whereas in matters domestic -- cookery, household management and interior design -- SF based its programmes on bourgeois norms, the practice of religion in the tradition of the Benedictines was something unknown to the middle classes. In particular, its requirement for women to be both reflective and participative encouraged SF mandos to articulate opinions and to be proactive in all areas of their operations. The fact that religion within SF was never proclaimed as ‘new’ takes nothing away from the effect it had. Neither should the fact that in the SF training programmes, religion and politics were strongly interlinked. It would be wrong to attribute to Pilar any wish to change the balance of gender roles, and her encouragement of women to be devout was at least partly in the belief that they would carry out their ‘mission’ as wives and mothers more effectively. Nonetheless, as in all areas of SF operations, it was not always possible to predict the outcomes for the transmitters of its messages.
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